The Secret Of A Happy Life

This new spiritual life I had entered had been given many different names. The Methodists called it “the Second Blessing” or “the Blessing of Sanctification.” The Presbyteri ans preferred “the Higher Life” or “the Life of Faith.” The Friends spoke of it as “the life hidden with Christ in God.” Whatever the terminology, the truth behind each phrase was exactly the same, and it could be reduced to four simple words: “Not I, but Christ.”

In every case, the heart of the matter was surrender — turning ourselves over to the Lord so that He might work within us, shaping both our desires and our actions according to His will. It meant taking Him at His word: trusting Him not only to save us from sin’s punishment but also from sin’s power, and believing His promise to give us grace and help in every moment of need.

Personally, I prefer to call this simply “the life of faith,” because that is the plainest description.

But in the book where I explained it most fully, I called it The Secret of a Happy Life , because for so long it truly had been a secret to me — and because I fear it is still a secret to hundreds of God’s children who are staggering under the same heavy burdens I once carried. It was not a secret because God hid it, but because I had not yet discovered it. It has always been an open secret — spread clearly across the pages of Scripture — if only I had possessed the spiritual perception to see it.

“The secrets of the gods are from of old, Guarded forever, and forever told; Blabbed in all ears, but published in a tongue Whose purport the gods only can unfold.”

An ox and a philosopher may look at the same field, yet see entirely different things. In the same way, before and after this glorious discovery, I looked at the same Bible and even read the same verses — but I saw them with entirely different eyes. Scripture, like nature, lies open to all, but not all truly see it. The law of gravitation operated plainly before humankind for ages, but only Newton recognized it. Likewise, the law of faith had been written plainly in the Bible, though I had failed to discern it. The forces we harness in nature were not created by us, only discovered; they existed just as truly before discovery as afterward. And I am certain that no scientific discoverer ever felt gre ater delight in uncovering nature’s secrets than I felt when I uncovered the “secrets of God.”

My joy was so great that I felt compelled to speak of it to everyone — to insist upon their listening. At first, my husband — an earnest and successful Christian worker — was somewhat alarmed. He feared I might be rejoicing in some error that would harm me and perhaps others.

He frequently returned to the argument that the “old man” within us could never be completely conquered in this life, and must always hold us in some degree of bondage.

One morning, as we were discussing this, I said, “Well, impossible or not, the Bible certainly says it. What does thee make of this passage in Romans 6: ‘Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.’ What else can that mean but that sin’s power is truly to be conquered, so that we need no longer serve it?”

Startled by the sudden light that seemed to flash from those words, he said, “There is no such passage in the Bible.”

“Oh yes, there is,” I replied. I opened my Bible and showed it to him. It was a verse he had, of course, known for years, yet in that moment it appeared to him with such a new and striking meaning that he felt as if he had never seen it before. It brought with it a deep conviction, and from that moment he did not rest until he had discovered the truth for himself.

His own account of this discovery, published in 1868, was as follows. After describing the lack he had been feeling in his Christian life, he continued: “I knew that the Bible seemed to promise a better life for the Christian than the one I knew, and for years the conviction had grown in me that there was some part of God’s truth that I had yet to discover. I felt that something essential was missing in the way I understood Scripture — something that would supply that spirit of love which the Bible declares is greater than all knowledge and all faith. I had often expressed my growing sense that some truth was waiting to bre ak forth from God’s Word— something that would fill our hearts with a love that could bear all things. My feeling was so strong that I arranged a meeting with several brethren well-versed in Scripture so that we might examine, carefully and in detail, what part of God’s Word we had failed to understand and to teach.

Circumstances delayed that meeting, but in the meantime — through a completely unexpected channel — I received the secret that taught me the joy of Christian liberty and the power of true service. That secret was faith . How strange that I, who had constantly taught faith as the channel for the forgiveness of sins, had failed to see that faith alone is also the means of deliverance from the inward power of sin. Not only the sinner, but the Christian also, must receive everything by faith.

“At this time, I met some Christians whose inner life, as they described it, seemed utterly different from mine. They declared that practical sanctification was obtained, just like justification, by simple faith; that it could be realized at any moment when one’s faith could fully grasp it; and they insisted that they themselves had experienced it. The subject continued to confront me, and again and again passages of Scripture were presented to me — passages to which I sincerely believed myself completely submissive. Yet I regarded the entire matter with profound unease, for it seemed to me that what they sought and claimed to possess was nothing less than perfection in the flesh —and that, I knew, was impossible.”

I can hardly describe the depth of prejudice I felt against this teaching. Few ideas had ever stirred such instinctive resistance in me, and I spent many anxious hours worrying over what I believed were the dangerous consequences of this “heresy” creeping in among us. My opposition was so determined that even familiar passages of Scripture — texts I had known for years — seemed strange and almost unrecognizable when someone quoted them to prove that sanctification was by faith, and that it was possible to “walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing.”

One morning, Romans 6:6 was read to me: “Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Christ, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.” My friend added, “Surely these words must m ean something — and something that makes it possible for a believer to cease being a slave to sin.”

I was so startled by the force of the verse that I blurted out emphatically, “That passage is not in the Bible!”— even though, in truth, it was one of the most familiar passages in all of Scripture to me. When I was forced to admit that it really was there, I took refuge in the explanation that it was merely judicial truth: something true “in God’s sight,” but never actually true in a Christian’s experience.

But from that moment, I began to wonder whether there might be some truth in what these people were teaching. Slowly it dawned on me that I had misunderstood them. They were not talking about perfection in the flesh, but about the death of the flesh — and a life hidden in Christ.

A life of abiding in Him, walking in Him, living through His power — a life of victory and joy that was truly pleasing to God.

“So that is all you mean?” I asked once, when this truth had been pressed upon me with unusual force. “That is nothing new. I have always known that.”

“But have you lived it?” came the reply.

“Yes,” I answered, “I have lived so at times. Often I have given myself wholly into the Lord’s care and realized that I was dead, and that He alone lived in me.”

“You have kno wn this as an occasional experience,” my friend said gently. “But have you ever known it as a life ? You say you sometimes take refuge in the Lord — but have you ever made your home in Him?”

I saw at once that I had not. My faith in this matter had been intermittent. In moments of unusual difficulty, or whenever I felt especially weak, I had turned exclusively to the Lord and had always found Him sufficient for my need. But that this occasional experience might become — and ought to become — the experience of my whole life had never occurred to me.

“What would you think,” my friend continued, “of people who trusted Christ in such an intermittent way for the salvation of their souls? Suppose one week they felt powerless and cast themselves entirely on Him, only to spend the next week trying to earn salvation partly themselves, merely asking Him to make up what they lacked. Would you not think such a course inconsistent and foolish? And yet is it not just as inconsistent — and just as dishonoring to Christ — to trust Him in this on-again, off-again way for your daily life? Sometimes walking by faith, sometimes relying on your own strength?”

I could not deny the truth of this, and the possibility — and beauty — of a life of continuous faith began to open before me.

Such was my husband’s account of his discovery. To my great joy, from that time forward we were entirely united in the matter. It was not that either of us believed we had become sinless, or that we never failed again. Rather, we had discovered the secret of victory — that we were no longer slaves to sin, compelled to yield to its power, but could, if we chose, become “more than conquerors through Him who loved us.”

This did not mean temptations ever ceased. But we had learned that the Lord is both able and willing to deliver us out of every temptation — if only we would trust Him. We saw that our old belief —that we were doomed to be lifelong “servants of sin”— was contrary to Scripture and a slander upon the completeness of Christ’s salvation, for He died precisely to free us from sin’s bondage. “For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under the law, but under grace.”

We learned further that faith — faith alone — was the road to victory, and that effort and self- struggle accomplished nothing in this battle. Our part was surrender and trust; God’s part was everything else.

For the third time, as I have said, a veil seemed to lift from the pages of Scripture, and everywhere we saw the “secret of victory” shining in letters of light. Old texts blossomed with new fullness. Take, for instance: “For whatsoever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that overcomes the world, even our faith. Who is he that overcomes the world, but he that believes that Jesus is the Son of God?” Formerly we thought this referred only to a future victory, after death. Now we saw it spoke of a present victory, by a present faith, while still living in the world.

Or this: “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.” We had always taken it to mean the rem oval of sin’s penalty . Now we saw it meant the removal of its power — that we need no longer serve it or be enslaved by it.

I could give countless examples of this unveiling of Scripture, but these must suffice. We had made a transforming discovery, and it filled our every thought. Whenever I met a friend, my first question was, “How much time do you have? I have something wonderful to tell you.” And I would pour out my story of the great salvation I had discovered.

To most, it was as new and delightful as it had been to me, and many immediately embraced it as an experiential reality. But one friend — the same who had awakened me to religious things at sixteen, and who had been my closest spiritual confidante ever since — listened and then said, “But Hannah, that is nothing new. I have always known that.”

“Then why,” I cried indignantly, “did you never tell me? You knew how I have struggled all these years — winning a few battles, losing far more — and all the while you had this secret of victory and never told me! How could you be so unkind?”

“But I thought everyone knew it,” she said. “It is what the Quakers have always taught. Their preaching is almost entirely about it.”

“Well,” I said, “everyone does not know it. Very few know it. Most Christians believe they must remain ‘servants of sin’ all their lives because of the weakness of the flesh. And most think that if they are ever to gain victory, they must fight for it themselves, and only if defeat seems imminent may they call the Lord to help. They do not understand that the battle is to be handed over to Him from the beginning — just as the Israelites stood still at the Red Sea and saw the salvation of the Lord.”

“And,” I added with conviction, “I intend to tell this to everyone I can.”

And I did. Young or old, whether mature Christians or beginners — no one escaped hearing the story if I dared speak. Nearly all who heard it embraced it and began to live in its power.

One of them was my little daughter, about seven or eight years old. She had begun to develop a strong willfulness that I found almost impossible to manage. She herself recognized it as wrong and tried hard to conquer it, but she seemed almost possessed by it. One day she came to me, puzzled, and said, “Mother, why am I so naughty? I know I’m a little C hristian girl, and I thought Christian children were always good. But no matter how hard I try to make myself good, I just can’t help being naughty.”

From my own experience, I understood her perfectly. I said, “I think, darling, the reason is that you are trying to make yourself good. We never can make ourselves good, try as we may. Only our Heavenly Father can do that. Whenever you feel tempted to be naughty, tell Him all about it, ask Him to make you good, and then trust Him to do it. He will surely take the naughtiness away.”

She thought a moment and said, “Oh, I didn’t know that. I thought you had to use your will and just do it yourself.”

She walked away quietly, clearly considering this new idea. Soon I noticed a great change. Her willfulness seemed entirely gone; she was gentle and obedient as a lamb. I said nothing, wanting to respect the delicacy of the moment. A few days later, I heard her playing softly with her dolls and murmuring with quiet delight, “Oh, I am so glad Heavenly Father is making me so good. It feels so nice to be good.”

Still I said nothing. But a few nights afterward, as I tucked her into bed, she burst out, “Oh, Mother, aren’t you glad Heavenly Father is making me so good? He’s going to make me a great deal gooder, but aren’t you glad He has made me as good as I am now?”

As I hugged and kissed her, rejoicing with her, she added earnestly, “Mother, do you tell everybody about this?”

I said I tried to, but she insisted, “You mustn’t only try— you must really do it every time you preach. I think lots of people are like I was — wanting to be good but not knowing how. You must tell every single person you meet.”

I have always taken that as a kind of divine call to my work.

In truth, our hearts were so full that we hardly needed encouragement. Everyone we knew heard the story eventually, and soon a great stir arose — not only in our own community, but throughout the American church and even in England. Letters poured in from all directions asking what this “new doctrine taught by the Pearsall Smiths of Millville, New Jersey” might be. Meetings and conferences sprang up that continue even to this day, many known as “meetings for the deepening of the spiritual life.”

This discovery was the beginning of a great revival in the spiritual life of the Church everywhere. It reached its height in the meetings of 1873 and 1874 on the Continent, and later at Oxford and Brighton, where thousands came to hear the message. Its effects are still felt in countless lives. Wherever I go, people tell me their whole lives were changed by what they learned there.

It was not a new religion they discovered, but the vitality of the old one. Truths they had long professed became living realities. They had called Christ their Savior; now they learned that He truly saves , and trusting Him, they found Him faithful.

There was nothing sectarian in the teaching. No one had to change creed or denomination.

Across all churches — Methodist, Quaker, Catholic, and more — there have always been those who truly understood and lived the life of faith. It lies, I believe, at the heart of every Christian creed. All that is needed is for believers to stop merely professing their faith and begin actually believing it — and they will always find it true.

The life of faith fits every creed and every denomination. The story is the same everywhere.